Abi Maxwell’s memoir One Day I’ll Grow Up and Be a Beautiful Woman: A Mother’s Story is a raw and unflinching portrait of a family thrust into the center of America’s ongoing cultural battles. At its heart, it is the story of a mother and daughter bound by love, resilience, and the determination to exist truthfully, even as the world around them questions their very right to do so. It is a book that not only charts the deeply personal journey of one family in New Hampshire but also illuminates the larger, national struggle faced by trans youth and their families as they navigate an era of relentless scrutiny and political hostility.
Maxwell grew up in rural New Hampshire, one of eight children in a family that lived on the edge of poverty. Her childhood was defined by both beauty and hardship. She remembers the grandeur of the mountains where she skied, the serenity of a lakeside cottage, and the fierce pride she felt in her gay brother who lived openly despite hostility. Yet she also recalls hunger, neglect, and the bullying that left her brother isolated and vulnerable, nearly breaking him. Those contradictions, the constant push and pull of beauty and struggle, echo throughout the memoir as she reflects on how her past shaped the way she parents her own child.
